


Monsters

by javabi



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Day At The Beach, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Ghouls, Kid Dean Winchester, Motherly love, POV Mary Winchester, dean and mary fighting monsters together :), vague s9 finale spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-29
Updated: 2014-05-29
Packaged: 2018-01-27 01:30:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1710032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/javabi/pseuds/javabi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mary Winchester's personal Heaven is a day at the beach with her toddler son, Dean. Even when things take a turn for the worst, it's still one of the best days in her short life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monsters

July 17th, 1982 existed eternally in Mary Winchester’s personal heaven.

If anyone ever asked her why then, why that  _particular_  day at the beach, she would probably just smile coyly and shrug her shoulders as if she didn’t know. To anyone else, the day that her tiny son was attacked by a ghoul would hardly be categorized as the best day ever. But to Mary it was much more than the day Dean was attacked; more importantly, it was the day that Dean fought back.

In Heaven, just as it had been on the day itself, the lake was dark and barely rippling with waves, like a blot of ink slightly disturbed by the dip of a quill. Sunlight smiled down on the beach below, highlighting the already bright sand and glistening off of plastic toys and wooden docks. Other families were scattered around throughout the beach, enjoying picnics and water games and radio talk shows. Mary watched them all happily, thinking of the other half of her little family. Baby Sam was with his dad, most likely sleeping peacefully in the Impala while John drove just for the sake of driving. Sometimes Mary thought he might love that car more than her.

“Mommy! MOM! Can we go to the big kid dock?”

“Not now, Dean. It’s lunchtime. Are you hungry?”

“Yep!”

She should have known better than to ask that question. The kid was  _always_  hungry. At three and a half years old he could probably already consume as much as she did. “What do you want to eat?” she asked as the little boy ran from the water back to their blanket, kicking sand and water everywhere and shedding his arm floaties so fast they were a blur.

“PIE!”

Laughing, Mary wiped sand from her son’s hands with a cloth and kissed his exposed belly. He squirmed away from her lips, but allowed her to continue cleaning off all the sand. “I didn’t bring pie. How about a sandwich?”

“Okay. But pie when we get home, right?” With as much sand as possible finally cleaned from his little body, Dean settled down onto the blanket beside his mother. His freckles were more prominent than ever in the summer sun, his blond hair flopping across his forehead limply in the heat. He was grinning eagerly up at his mother, waiting for a reply.

“Of course.”

“With ice cream?”

“Definitely.”

“Awesome!”

Mary laughed and handed over half of a peanut butter and banana sandwich. Still smiling, she bit into her own sandwich while spreading out the rest of their picnic.

Yes, the day was perfect even by a normal person’s standards. To Mary, with her hunters’ childhood and inexperience with such relaxation, it was  _sublime_.

She should have known it was too good to be true.

After lunch Dean decided he wanted to build a sandcastle, and was very adamant about making sure that his mother was not going to help him this time. So Mary opened her book and kept one eye on the little boy in front of her, one eye on the page under her nose.

When another child came over to join Dean, Mary thought nothing of it. Dean was good at playing with other kids, and it seemed that this time would be no different. The small redheaded boy was cooperating well enough, following Dean’s every demand to the letter and giggling at all of her son’s jokes. Similarly, Dean seemed pleased for the company. Mary went back to her book.

Ten minutes later Dean let out a bloodcurdling squeal of pain and fear.

Mary leapt to her feet, knowing that her son wouldn’t yell for nothing. Sure enough, she looked up to find the redheaded boy on top of Dean, and he seemed to be trying to bite her son’s arm. Mary’s blood went cold; there was clearly something supernatural about the new kid, and that wasn’t good.

Thinking fast, Mary realized she couldn’t do anything about the boy in broad daylight. Physically fighting him was not an option, as that was sure to draw the attention (and probably the intervention) of other parents on the beach. Just as she was about to try and lure the child into a more secluded area, she realized that Dean had taken matters into his own hands.

Her son managed to hit the other child (or whatever it was) hard in the head with one of his wooden toy shovels, and even if it didn’t stop the creature it bought her little boy enough time to scramble out of harm’s way. Dean stumbled to his feet and started running towards Mary, yelling “MOMMY!”

“It’s ok, Dean – follow me, all right? Quickly!”

She grabbed his hand and ran into the thicket behind their blanket, scooping the little boy up into her arms as they went. Just as she’d planned, the redhead scampered after them, and soon enough all three of them would be well out of sight of the beach’s other inhabitants. In seconds Mary’s knife was in her hand. She thanked her lucky stars that she still carried the thing around, and (without loosening her grip on Dean) waited for the redhead to enter the thicket.

“Dean, honey,” Mary whispered into her son’s ear. The little boy was surprisingly calm, his green eyes fixed on his mother’s face, pudgy hands locked securely around her neck. “keep looking at me, ok? No matter what happens next, I need you to—“

She didn’t have time to finish her sentence. The creature was right in front of her.

“I don’t know what you are,” Mary snarled, still too far away to get a good swipe at the thing with her knife. “but I’m warning you to leave us alone. I won’t say it twice.”

The redhead cocked his head to the side. It would have been cute if the creature hadn’t smiled so creepily when he did it. “Great hunter like you can’t even recognize a ghoul when you see one? Guess you’re losing your touch, Campbell.”

“Hope you enjoyed eating the kid you’re dressed up as now,” Mary spat. “That’ll be the last meal you ever get. Now come a little closer so I can say a proper hello.”

The ghoul laughed, a bone-chillingly low giggle that didn’t quite fit the child’s mouth it came from. “That pretty boy in your arms, is he your son? He’ll make a nice snack. I’ll pick my teeth with his fingers, the little—“

“I’m not a snack!” Dean yelled suddenly, his fierce little voice cutting through the ghoul’s diatribe. Pushing down her pride in favor of the fear fluttering behind her ribcage, Mary shushed her son.

“Saucy!” the ghoul cackled, literally licking its lips. Annoyance and disgust filled Mary’s stomach at the sight, rolling inside her like the waves just beyond their thicket. “Just the way I like ‘em.”

Just as Mary was about to taunt something else to make the ghoul come a little closer, Dean again took action first. This time he hurled a rock at the ghoul, which he had apparently stored in his pocket earlier. Miraculously, it hit the creature in the cheek, just below the eye, and it screamed in pain. Furious, the ghoul surged forward with a screech, arms outstretched to grab Mary and her little boy—

With a flash of silver, Mary swiped her blade across the ghoul’s throat before it could take a step closer than necessary. Blood splattered everywhere and Dean buried his face in Mary’s neck. The ghoul’s head rolled across the ground, its body falling in a crumpled heap. The danger had passed.

“Dean?” Mary crooned softly into her son’s ear. “Honey, it’s going to be all right. He’s gone, and he won’t be coming back. Are you ok?”

Resting his chin on his mother’s shoulder, Dean replied softly. “Yes. But I wanna go home.”

“I know, sweetheart. We’ll go right now.”

Dean nodded and lifted his head. He was staring at the little body at his mother’s feet. “Why did he do that stuff, Mommy?”

“He wasn’t really a little boy. He was a monster.” Mary said evenly as she stepped out of the thicket, Dean still clutched in her arms. He was squirming a little, clearly eager to get down, but she wasn’t quite ready to let go of him. Not yet.

“A  _monster_? But you’ll protect me from those, right Mommy? If another one tries to get me?”

Smiling sadly, Mary recalled the conversation she had had with John about this subject almost exactly four years ago. No monsters, not for her boys. Not ever. “Of course, sweetie. I will always be here to protect you from the monsters.”

“Okay.”

Mary Winchester was wrong. Oh, she was  _so_  wrong.

If only she could see her son today, the man who didn’t need protection from the monsters anymore because he had become one himself. If she could see her son today, could see his black eyes and twisted soul, she wouldn’t need to protect him, and Mary knew that.

But she would always love him.

 

-fin-

**Author's Note:**

> I like the idea of Mary being secretly proud of her son's fighting ability, even if she doesn't want him (and Sam) to have hunters' lives. Also I can't help but wonder how she would react to Dean's recent transformation - as you can see, I don't think it would impact her much at all ♥
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!!


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